1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method, system, and article of manufacture for accessing removable storage management services to obtain replacement instructions indicating whether to replace removable storage.
2. Description of the Related Art
Data storage customers often maintain a library of removable storage, such as tape cartridges, to store data. Alternately, these libraries may hold optical disk cartridges or hard-disk cartridges. The customer manages the tape library to replace tapes that fail or have reached their end of life. Preferably, the customer will replace a tape at the end of life before failure to allow for the migration of data from the tape approaching end of life. However, the customer may not be able to determine when tape cartridges are approaching their end of life (EOL). The customer may observe increased time for backup operations before the cartridge fails, resulting in decreased performance. However, the customer cannot be assured that such observed decreased performance results from a failing tape used to access the tape or a marginal tape. Further, vendors have to provide significant customer support to assist customers in the recovery of their data when tape cartridges fail before the cartridge can be replaced before failure.
There is a need in the art for improved techniques for managing the replacement of removable storages.